David Schwinghammer's Blog - Posts Tagged "obsession"
The Secret History
The first Donna Tartt novel I read was THE LITTLE FRIEND. Harriet Dufresnes reminded me of what Scout Finch might have been like during her teen years. Most of the reviews I read compared that book unfavorably to THE SECRET HISTORY, but I didn’t read it until after I’d read THE GOLDFINCH for which Tartt won the Pulitzer. Harriet was a likable character; you won’t find a likable character in THE GOLDFINCH or THE SECRET HISTORY, unless you count the furniture maker in THE GOLDFINCH who doesn’t have all that much to do with the story.
THE SECRET HISTORY is about a half dozen Greek students who devote most of their academic career to Julian, their guru of a teacher. He insists that they take most of their classes with him. The main character is Richard, a scholarship student at Hampden University in Vermont, who tries to hide the fact that he has little money. Henry is the obsessive leader who doesn’t care about much else except Greek. Bunny is the screw-up of the group; his parents won’t give him any money, so he basically leeches off everybody else, especially Henry, who’s supposed to be his best friend. Then there are the Twins, Camilla and Charles; something incestuous seems to be going on there. Francis is a homosexual who makes a pass at Richard. Francis also has lots of money, and they spend at lot of time at his grandmother’s palatial home a few miles from the college. One day during class, Julian and the class discuss the maenads, the wild women of ancient Greece who worshipped Dionysus, God of wine, with wild revelry. They were so unlike the rational view we have of such great intellectuals as Sophocles, Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates. Julian explains that you can’t be rational all the time; you need a recess of sorts, where you let it all hang out (my words, not his).
Henry and the others, except Bunny and Richard, decide to create their own Bacchanal, where they break free of reality. They fail repeatedly; a few times Bunny is with them, but he’s such a blabbermouth, Henry really doesn’t trust him. They finally succeed and they’re racing through the fields and woods outside Hampden when they encounter a farmer who owns the land. They’re dressed like the students from “Animal House,” so you can imagine how he reacts. Anyway, something terrible happens, and the Greek students spend the rest of the novel trying to dodge local authorities and even the FBI.
For some reason, Henry trusts Richard enough to tell him what happened in the woods. One is tempted to believe he does this because Richard is telling the story and Tartt needs Henry to tell Richard. Tartt does this with Richard’s background, too. He took two years of Greek in California before landing his scholarship at Hampden; he needs a foreign language and doesn‘t want to waste the two years he already has. At first Julian won’t take Richard as a student, until he helps the others with an assignment, and they vouch for him. Richard knows something about ancient Greek grammar that these wizards don’t know?
Anyway, Bunny is able to put two and two together, thanks to newspaper accounts of what happened in the woods, and he can’t keep his mouth shut; he’s constantly teasing the others about what they did. Henry isn’t the bosom buddy Bunny thinks he is. He’s more of a sociopath; so you can guess what happens next. Tartt isn’t really good at throwing in the unexpected twist. After the second “incident” Charles starts to lose it, drinking way too much, and Henry makes it worse by showing interest in Camilla. Richard is also drinking too much and Henry is acting like he’s “the boss of them”.
So then, what’s this story about? You could say it’s about obsession in that otherwise brilliant students like Henry and the others would try something so asinine as the bacchanal in the first place. You could say it’s about putting all your eggs in one basket as the Greek students do with Julian. Think Joseph Smith; think Reverend Moon. It’s obviously an ego thing with Julian; he takes only the best and the brightest, and he’s like a father to them, especially Henry. But like a lot of heroes this one has feet of clay.
THE SECRET HISTORY is about a half dozen Greek students who devote most of their academic career to Julian, their guru of a teacher. He insists that they take most of their classes with him. The main character is Richard, a scholarship student at Hampden University in Vermont, who tries to hide the fact that he has little money. Henry is the obsessive leader who doesn’t care about much else except Greek. Bunny is the screw-up of the group; his parents won’t give him any money, so he basically leeches off everybody else, especially Henry, who’s supposed to be his best friend. Then there are the Twins, Camilla and Charles; something incestuous seems to be going on there. Francis is a homosexual who makes a pass at Richard. Francis also has lots of money, and they spend at lot of time at his grandmother’s palatial home a few miles from the college. One day during class, Julian and the class discuss the maenads, the wild women of ancient Greece who worshipped Dionysus, God of wine, with wild revelry. They were so unlike the rational view we have of such great intellectuals as Sophocles, Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates. Julian explains that you can’t be rational all the time; you need a recess of sorts, where you let it all hang out (my words, not his).
Henry and the others, except Bunny and Richard, decide to create their own Bacchanal, where they break free of reality. They fail repeatedly; a few times Bunny is with them, but he’s such a blabbermouth, Henry really doesn’t trust him. They finally succeed and they’re racing through the fields and woods outside Hampden when they encounter a farmer who owns the land. They’re dressed like the students from “Animal House,” so you can imagine how he reacts. Anyway, something terrible happens, and the Greek students spend the rest of the novel trying to dodge local authorities and even the FBI.
For some reason, Henry trusts Richard enough to tell him what happened in the woods. One is tempted to believe he does this because Richard is telling the story and Tartt needs Henry to tell Richard. Tartt does this with Richard’s background, too. He took two years of Greek in California before landing his scholarship at Hampden; he needs a foreign language and doesn‘t want to waste the two years he already has. At first Julian won’t take Richard as a student, until he helps the others with an assignment, and they vouch for him. Richard knows something about ancient Greek grammar that these wizards don’t know?
Anyway, Bunny is able to put two and two together, thanks to newspaper accounts of what happened in the woods, and he can’t keep his mouth shut; he’s constantly teasing the others about what they did. Henry isn’t the bosom buddy Bunny thinks he is. He’s more of a sociopath; so you can guess what happens next. Tartt isn’t really good at throwing in the unexpected twist. After the second “incident” Charles starts to lose it, drinking way too much, and Henry makes it worse by showing interest in Camilla. Richard is also drinking too much and Henry is acting like he’s “the boss of them”.
So then, what’s this story about? You could say it’s about obsession in that otherwise brilliant students like Henry and the others would try something so asinine as the bacchanal in the first place. You could say it’s about putting all your eggs in one basket as the Greek students do with Julian. Think Joseph Smith; think Reverend Moon. It’s obviously an ego thing with Julian; he takes only the best and the brightest, and he’s like a father to them, especially Henry. But like a lot of heroes this one has feet of clay.
